aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South

Saturday, December 30, 2006

2007 Prediction: User Generated Devices

Fred Wilson has my favorite 2007 prediction:

Yes, the web has brought this power of the user to the forefront of our society, enough to make us the person of the year. That’s cool.

But what is cooler is that this is part of a larger revolution in information technology that started back in the early 90s with Linux. It’s the open source movement and it’s about opening up technology so that anyone and everyone can contribute to the collective good.

And I believe its time for this revolution in information technology to move into the hardware space. It’s time for user generated devices. [...]

[T]he existing consumer electronics manufacturers aren’t interested in modularity and giving the user more control over their devices. Their desire to tightly control the user experience will lead to a movement much like what has happened on the web.

Users are going to take control of their devices and I think 2007 is the year we will start to see it happen.